


The Effigy in the Mirror

by deskclutter



Category: The Sandman
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-22
Updated: 2010-06-22
Packaged: 2017-10-10 05:37:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/96173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deskclutter/pseuds/deskclutter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Despair's claim on life, and a look at Herself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Effigy in the Mirror

  
**Title:** The Effigy in the Mirror  
**Day/Theme:** February 03 / the wicked daughter  
**Series:** Sandman  
**Character/Pairing:** Despair  
**Rating:** PG  
_**ef . fi . gy** n.  
1\. A crude figure or dummy representing a hated person or group.  
2\. A likeness or image, especially of a person._

She draws the ring down her cheek and feels liquid spring from the jagged tear of skin and muscle to flow down like crimson tears, dark red in a world of mist and mirrors. A suitable incongruity of blood falling under the scuttling of rat paws, as a crack in a grimy glass that would otherwise be smooth.

Around her the mirrors reflect and reflect and they magnify, as is their wont, making her larger and uglier as befits her. She looks into the mirrors and eyes stare back, dulled and hopeless. She sees herself in humans, a legacy shared with her siblings, but her siblings do not feel quiet relief when they look into the world through dreams or death or from underneath the skin when they look to find the dwindling number of beings who knew her as her former self. She understands that no one judges her, that none compare her to the great lady to whom the current cannot compare, which is why she has tunnelled into her duty with a steadiness that resembles somewhat the tear trail on her cheek as it drags down to her chin. She is one twin of two, one player of games among three, one sister of the younger four. She is one Endless among seven, and her roots spindle out as spider web, tangling and strangling to prevent mortality from occurring again.

She does not wish to die, which ought to be a contradiction for a creature such as herself who is so buried within her function as she is (and the mist of her twin in her imagination whispers over her shoulder with the sharp ghost of a smile, "as we _all_ are, sweet sister"). It is one matter to understand that she is not judged; it is another to see the faces of those who have not gone before and _know_ that their despair is her doing alone.

'Endless' is a lie. None save Despair knows it so well, for she is the second incarnation to a first. She is the odd piece in the white puzzle: her colour fits, but her shape is the slightest out of order and though she has her place, it is as wrong as the one discordant note that destroys a melody. She is the sister who is out of step, the daughter of the universe a pace behind the beat. None other feels the disquieting relief she feels when she looks into the toys inside her mirrors.

Despair pulls the ring from her cheek and looks into the mirror (world). She sees herself and no other.


End file.
